Charles Pierce: We Can't Trust a Major American Police Department. That's a Problem.

[eridani]

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/36331-we-cant-trust-a-major-american-police-department-thats-a-problem

There seems to be little doubt that the city of Chicago—Rahm Emanuel, mayor—no longer can control its police department effectively. That was made clear with the release of a scathing report compiled by a special investigative task force commissioned by Emanuel last year in the wake of the shooting of Laquan McDonald, and subsequent cover-up, a cover-up in which Emanuel allegedly was involved.

C.P.D.'s own data gives validity to the widely held belief the police have no regard for the sanctity of life when it comes to people of color," the task force wrote. "Stopped without justification, verbally and physically abused, and in some instances arrested, and then detained without counsel — that is what we heard about over and over again." The report reinforces complaints made for decades by African-American residents who have said they were unfairly singled out by officers without justification on a regular basis, then ignored when they raised complaints…In a city where whites, blacks and Hispanics each make up about one-third of the population, 74 percent of the 404 people shot by the Chicago police between 2008 and 2015 were black, the report said. Black people were the subjects in 72 percent of the thousands of investigative street stops that did not lead to arrests during the summer of 2014. Three out of every four people on whom Chicago police officers tried to use Taser guns between 2012 and 2015 were black. And black drivers made up 46 percent of police traffic stops in 2013.

The release of the report comes during a time of renewed scrutiny of the facility at Homan Square where the CPD essentially ran its own equivalent of a CIA black site, complete with torture.

Sound familiar? This past year, in the shadow of the Laquan McDonald police shooting scandal, investigative reporters from The Guardian and their lawyers have exposed, in numerous articles, that Chicago's history of torture and cover-up is repeating itself, this time at Homan Square.

[jomin41]

1. C.P.D. may be the worst, but it's not alone.

American policing has gone to hell. Actually, the whole American criminal justice system has gone to hell.

[Fast Walker 52]

3. exactly... in a just world, the whole system would be torn down and rebuilt from scratch

http://harvardkennedyschoolreview.com/the-criminal-justice-system-is-not-broken-its-doing-exactly-what-its-meant-to-do/

Our criminal justice system works exactly as designed. Its original purpose was to incarcerate poor men of color, which the criminal justice system does with painful intensity. Efforts to reform the criminal justice system focus on stopping wrongful convictions, changing drug policies, putting video cameras on police officers, and reducing sentences for crimes. These reforms are well intentioned and may help some communities. But the system remains designed to disenfranchise, harm, and incarcerate people of color. That must change.

[skepticscott]

4. Yep, my reaction on reading the headline was

"What do you mean A major police department, Charles?"

[rafeh1]

5. It openly calls itself a criminal justice system

The prime directive is innocent until you run out of money.
The rich criminals get off on technicalities found by expensive lawyers and shysters while the poor innocent plea bargain

[Wounded Bear]

2. It's about time we shed some light on this shit...

It is a festering sore on the body politic.